2.6 Calculations
The bare soil area consisted of all bare soil patches, and the vegetated
surface area was estimated by the plot areas minus the bare soil areas.
The bare soil area in the disturbed plot was estimated by adding all
bare soil patch areas. In each undisturbed plot, bare soil areas were
considered zero, and the vegetated surface area was considered 100%.
The palatable plant biomass was calculated by the following equation:GB =Bq ⨯δva , whereGB , Bq and δva were
the palatable plant biomass at the plot, palatable plant biomass at the
quadrat scale (g m-2) and vegetated surface area,
respectively. The plant species richness in a quadrat (1 m×1 m) was
measured by the species number of each quadrat. Soil water storage was
performed using the method recommended by Jia et al. (2020). The soil
organic carbon stock per plot was estimated by using the methods
described by Pang et al. (2020a). The soil total nitrogen, phosphorus
and potassium stocks per plot were quantified according to the method of
Pang et al. (2020b).